1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the field of detection devices. More particularly, it concerns apparatus and methods utilizing three electrode potentiostats to detect biomolecules and other target analytes in a concurrent manner.
2. Description of Related Art
The ability to design, cheap and disposable diagnostics and analytical platforms that are also biodegradable is of great value to health care as well as the environment. It has been established that size based confinement of biomolecules is critical for achieving enhanced sensitivity in diagnostics. Typically, size based confinement is achieved through complex fabrication processes as used for complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) technologies, which increases the cost per unit and increases the effective cost of the technology. Low cost technologies use printed circuit boards which are difficult to dispose and add costs to the environment due to poor biodegradability. Paper-based microfluidics have been developed that typically use screen printing technologies; however, issues remain with respect to achieving controlled fluid flow on top the surfaces.
Similarly, currently available market potentiostats are designed with the focus of applicability to a wide range of electrical/electrochemical techniques. This leads to bulky form factors and expensive components used in their construction. Moreover, they are designed to be used for electrochemical applications. Specific problems with such market potentiostats include the fact that they have large device form factors, making it difficult for use in point-of-care settings, have high noise at low current and low voltage settings, have expensive and repetitive software and firmware costs, have analog serial input/output interfaces, and have low robustness and non-universality in global application. On the other extreme, handheld portable potentiostats are very limited in customizability and applicability to a range of applications. Portable potentiostats are not noise efficient for biological applications and hence lack robustness. Specific problems with handheld potentiostats include high noise at low current and low voltage settings, low robustness for application to biosensing, and minimal operation choices for electrochemical applications.
Currently available market potentiostats are available as two electrode and three electrode systems. Both the currently available two electrode and three electrode potentiostats apply a single input voltage between two electrodes. This single applied input voltage suffers from limited specificity in detecting target analytes.
Therefore, there remains a need for affordable, efficient, biodegradable diagnostic platforms having enhanced specificity in detecting target analytes.